


Family, Fortitude, Fence-building, and Friendly Propaganda

by shadydave



Series: Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies [2]
Category: The Dresden Files - Jim Butcher, Welcome to Night Vale
Genre: Conspiracy, Deaf Character, Deleted Scenes, M/M, Meet the Family
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-04-30
Updated: 2015-04-30
Packaged: 2018-03-26 09:58:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3846628
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadydave/pseuds/shadydave
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Don't worry," says Cecil. "They'll like you."</p>
<p>"You think so?" asks Carlos.</p>
<p>"Of course!" says Cecil. "Sure, you're maybe a tiny bit of an outsider, but my family is almost as tolerant as I am!"</p>
<p>Carlos stares at him. "Steve Carlsberg is your brother-in-law," he says.</p>
<p>---<br/> <br/>Takes place between Chapters 10 and 11 of <a href="http://archiveofourown.org/works/2207475">Love is All You Need to Destroy Your Enemies</a>. This will probably make more sense if you read that first, but you know your context clue skills better than I do, so... do what your heart tells you, I guess.</p>
<p>Content notes at end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Family, Fortitude, Fence-building, and Friendly Propaganda

When Carlos lets himself into Cecil's apartment, he finds Cecil sprawled upside-down on his couch: knees hooked over its back, right arm over his face and the left flung to the side. 

“Are you okay?” asks Carlos.

Cecil sighs and flaps his hand dismissively.

“Right,” says Carlos. He drops his bag by the door and walks forward until he collapses face-first on the other end of the couch.

"Rough day?" asks Cecil, several minutes later.

"Argh," says Carlos into the couch cushions. "You?"

"I'm expecting a call," says Cecil darkly. "And there’s a bad case of imposter syndrome going around the office.”

Carlos pushes himself up onto his elbows so quickly he loses his balance and rolls off the couch. "What?"

"Imposter syndrome?" says Cecil. "You know, the chronic condition where the little voice in the back of your head tells you you've somehow fooled everyone into thinking you're a responsible professional and despite all your accomplishments you'll never be good enough and you only got your job because of your predecessor's sudden, probably violent end and you should just give up and give your budget to the sales department. Or maybe that last part was one of the Seans. They think pretty loudly during staff meetings."

"Oh," says Carlos. He stays on the floor, but sits up and leans against the couch by Cecil's head. "I thought you meant – never mind."

Cecil sighs again.

"You... really feel like that?" asks Carlos. 

"Caught it as a kid," says Cecil. "You'd think that would mean I'd be immune now, but noooo."

"But you're... you're... you're _really good_ at your job, Cecil."

"Well," says Cecil, but Carlos can see the blush creeping up his neck as all his blood rushes coyly to his head.

"And even I feel like that sometimes," says Carlos. "But that's what performance reviews are for: collecting honest data and evaluating your capabilities."

They're also good for analyzing who's been watching you and what they've been saying and whether or not their comments were justly earned or are merely a smokescreen for their true intent: leading you away from sensitive information or manipulating you into doing their bidding or sabotaging your missions or all three at once, because late last night Carlos' strike team followed orders from the Senior Council to rendezvous with a group of the Venatori at a secure location, and they were ambushed by the Fomor even though said secure location was supposed to be 1) miles away from the nearest Fomor-occupied territory and 2) _secure_ , and while they only lost one Venator and were delayed in delivering their report for just six hours, that's one Venator and six hours they're never going to get back.

"Thank you, Carlos," says Cecil. "What's got you down?"

Carlos slumps against the couch and looks Cecil in the face, or at least in the right elbow. “Do you ever feel like a vast conspiracy has penetrated every level of your government, covertly allying with your enemies to bring about some unknown yet terrifying evil plan?” 

"Oh, sure," says Cecil. "All the time." 

"How do you..." Carlos gestures vaguely, then realizes Cecil can't see him. "How do you... deal with it?"

"Public service announcements," says Cecil. "Or huddling in my pantry. Or public service announcements about huddling in my pantry."

"Aren't you worried they might be listening?"

"Well, only a few people have a key to my apartment and my pantry's pretty hard to find," says Cecil. Carlos lets out a snort, though he has a feeling Cecil's not joking. Cecil has a wildly inconsistent sense of self-preservation matched with an equally inconsistent set of survival skills.

Although Carlos did almost get lost trying to find where he kept his Flaky-Os one morning, so at least there's that.

Cecil wraps his left arm around Carlos’ neck and pulls him close, like a friendly and comforting headlock. He pats Carlos on the back of the head a few times before letting his hand settle on Carlos’ hair. "It doesn't really matter, anyway," says Cecil. "Somebody's always listening and somebody's always conspiring. Thinking about it too much is like huddling in your pantry while wiggling the bottom shelf out until it collapses and you're crushed under the weight of five dozen cans of light red kidney beans."

"Cecil, I've been meaning to talk to you about those."

"They were on sale, in addition to being similically useful," says Cecil. "My point is: you probably can't escape anyway, so why end up buried in canned goods? Much better to huddle unbruised in the darkness and take some small comfort that there are others doing the same thing." He adds, a little shyly, "You can use mine, if you like. I know you don't have a pantry."

Carlos' heart gives a sharp jolt and stutters, like the impact of a can of light red kidney beans (15 oz, not one of the big 24 oz ones) as it hits the floor and rolls away. But he also turns his head to a hide a smile in the crook of Cecil’s arm, because – he doesn't agree with Cecil, not really; if Carlos is going to hide, it's so he can set up an ambush, and a can of beans in a sock makes a surprisingly effective weapon. But Cecil's not wrong about how it feels to know you have allies, to stare into a vast and crushing darkness and know that at least one other person stands beside you, and Cecil – Cecil wants to share that with Carlos. 

"You should buy some dark red kidney beans," says Carlos. "Then I can make chili and we'll have more room."

Cecil lets go of Carlos and slithers down off the couch until his shoulders hit the floor with a faint _thump_. Then he grabs the collar of Carlos’ labcoat and pulls him down for a kiss, and for a few seconds Carlos forgets all about darkness and violence and conspiracies.

Cecil's cell phone rings.

Cecil mutters several words that would get him fined by the FCC as he unholsters his phone from his rope belt. "What," he snaps into the receiver, instead of his normal cheerful "Hello?" or "This is Cecil!" or "How did you get this number?! Haha, just kidding – wait, who is this?" 

Cecil scowls and says, "No, you _can't_ ask me a question, Steve Carlsberg! You get one question per phone call and you wasted it on that!" 

He hangs up and flings the phone across the room. It bounces off the easy chair and knocks over a vase on the end table.

"Uh," says Carlos.

"Thank goodness _that's_ over with," says Cecil. "Can you believe the nerve?"

His phone starts playing a mournful harpsichord riff.

Cecil swears and does a half-somersault, half-scramble off the couch, crawls over Carlos, and fishes his phone out from the wreckage of the vase. "Janis! Hello!"

Cecil listens intently for a moment, then says, "No, I agree, your band-aids are extremely stylish. I'm tempted to cut a few fingers myself so I too can festoon my digits with the tentacular goodness of Hello Kitty and her _adorable_ bat-winged friends!"

Carlos makes a face at him, trying to convey "That's a terrible idea," and "What is going on," and "Why would they make Hello Kitty _more_ unnerving by adding tentacles," all at once. 

Cecil gives him a cheerful wave. "Of course I'll ask him!" he says, then lowers the phone. "Carlos, are you free Sunday evening?"

"...Yes?" he says.

"Would you like to have dinner with me and Abbie and Janis? Steve Carlsberg will be there too, unfortunately, but if you kind of angle your chair it's pretty easy to ignore—"

"They're... inviting me to dinner?" says Carlos faintly. There's a distant roaring in his ears, like an echo of the sound of approximately sixteen HK 4.6x30mm cartridges a second disintegrating against his shield, but somehow more frightening. 

"They certainly are!"

Carlos swallows. "I'm going to meet your family," he says, trying so hard to keep his voice steady it flattens the question into a statement, and then Cecil tells Janis, "He says yes!" so it _is_ a statement now, a fact, and oh God Cecil is going to introduce him to his _family_. He's going to have to make a _good impression_. Cecil is going to take Carlos into his sister's home and show him off specifically so they can judge him and decide whether or not they think he's worthy of Cecil's – worthy of _Cecil_.

He startles as Cecil plops down next him. 

"Don't worry," says Cecil, flipping his phone shut. He puts an arm around Carlos' shoulders and kisses his temple. "They'll like you."

"You think so?" asks Carlos.

"Of course!" says Cecil. "Sure, you're maybe a tiny bit of an outsider, but they're almost as tolerant as I am!"

Carlos stares at him. "Steve Carlsberg is your brother-in-law," he says.

Cecil sighs gustily. "I know," he says. "It makes it very difficult to exclude him."

"You _hate him_ ," says Carlos.

"Don't be silly," says Cecil. "I would never give him the satisfaction."

Carlos lets his head flop back onto Cecil's sofa. Maybe if he's lucky the White Council will erupt in violent, bloody revolution this weekend. It will be easy to identify double agents when they’re trying to kill him. Skipping dinner will be a sacrifice, but it's one he's prepared to make.

~*~*~*~

Sunday evening, at precisely sundown, Carlos finds himself holding the invisible pie Cecil made for dessert and walking next to Cecil up the ramp to his sister's ranch house.

"I should call the lab," says Carlos, fishing around his pockets for his cell phone. "Maybe the scientists—"

“Oh no you don’t, mister,” says Cecil. He grabs Carlos' hand and firmly entwines their fingers.

Carlos sags in defeat. Then he straightens, because he doesn't want to send the wrong message with his poor posture. Night Valeans have shunned people for worse.

Cecil seems remarkably unconcerned about what's at stake. But Cecil claims that Carlos is perfect, regardless of a considerable amount of evidence to the contrary. He probably hasn't even considered the possibility that someone might not like Carlos. Not someone like Steve Carlsberg, who can be safely ignored, but someone whose thoughts mean a lot to him, whose opinion carries real weight. Someone like his niece. Someone like his sister. 

Carlos has met them both, but that was back when Cecil was just a voice on the radio and Janis was still a baby and the hole in the vacant lot out back of the Ralph's was not yet a hole but the burned-out structure of Sammy's Ultimate Sliceria. Abbie swore at Carlos for blowing out both her hearing aids with magic as he tried to disintegrate all the mold demons swarming over the ruins, and then ran over his foot with Janis' stroller as she and about a dozen other wayward shoppers made an ultimately successful escape attempt. Carlos is intensely glad his hood was up at the time and she probably won't recognize him.

Part of the problem is that Carlos just does not have enough intel for this situation. He has a pretty good grasp of Janis' after-school activities, thanks to Cecil, but no idea whether Janis really enjoys them or just goes because her parents and/or local government mandates make her. And that crayon drawing that hangs on Cecil’s refrigerator – did she make that because she likes art? Or because crayon drawings are an accepted currency among the elementary school set? Sure, Carlos normally gets along pretty well with kids, but what is he supposed to do when he hasn’t become friendly enough with their parents to feel comfortable with his back-up plan of bribing them with candy until they associate him with positive rewards?

He knows even less about Abbie, apart from her frankly impressive land speed and lexicon of profanity. Though they seem to get along just fine, Cecil hardly ever talks about her for reasons Carlos has yet to determine.

It figures that the person Carlos knows the most about is _Steve Carlsberg_. It also figures that everything he knows revolves around Steve’s perceived flaws and is thus completely useless for making polite conversation or endearing himself to Steve’s loved ones.

Cecil rings the doorbell. There’s a flash of light under the door and a noise like a player piano falling down the stairs. Carlos takes one last desperate look at their surroundings; unfortunately, everything seems perfectly calm.

Cecil squeezes his hand. "Stop worrying!" he says. "I'm sure you'll pass with flying colors."

"Pass _what_?" hisses Carlos. 

But before Cecil can respond, they hear footsteps approach the door from inside the house. He gives Carlos an exaggerated wink in lieu of an answer, which does absolutely nothing to relieve this new and differently anxiety-inducing misgiving about the impending dinner.

After about twenty seconds’ worth of faint rattling, the door opens a few inches. Carlos catches a glimpse of about seven different locks and a thick safety chain and a suspicious gaze before the door shuts again. Then it opens all the way and reveals Cecil's sister.

There's not much of a resemblance between them, but she and Cecil do have the same eyes. Probably.

She looks Carlos up and down, and says, "You are pretty hot, I'll give you that. But you could use a haircut."

“Uh,” says Carlos.

“ _No_ , he doesn’t,” says Cecil.

Abbie pokes Cecil in the stomach. “You’re putting on weight,” she says approvingly. “Does that mean you finally learned how to cook something besides steak and polenta tartare?”

"I can cook _lots of things_ ," says Cecil, which is something of an exaggeration. "But if you _must_ know, Carlos has been making breakfast _and_ dinner for me, because as I have said many times he is in all ways perfect."

Abbie raises her eyebrows and signs something Carlos doesn't recognize (which is admittedly most things apart from the alphabet, "My name is Warden Ramirez," and "Look out!"). He catches _Good_ followed by something that involves making two peace signs and banging them together. 

" _Grace Abigail Palmer_ ," hisses Cecil, covering Carlos' ears. "He's standing right here!"

"Yes, I know," says Abbie. She keeps trying to catch Carlos' eye; he plasters on a smile that probably registers more on the rictus scale and looks away before he can start a soulgaze.

“You’re very shifty-eyed,” she says with a frown. "Cow it."

"Cow it?" asks Carlos weakly.

"Well, if it isn't my favorite brother-in-arms!"

Cecil says, "I am _not_ your—" then cuts off in an indignant squawk as Steve Carlsberg bounds outside and tries to give him a hug. He darts behind Carlos, who suddenly finds himself being used as a human shield against familial affection.

"Uncle Cecil! Look, I'm wearing the whole set!" 

Janis stops just inside the doorway and taps her mother on the back of the leg. Abbie stops scrutinizing Carlos and smiles down at her daughter as she lets Janis roll past, which makes her look slightly less terrifying. 

"Janis!" says Cecil. He pokes Carlos in the back until Carlos takes a step forward, effectively cutting off Steve Carlsberg’s flanking maneuver, then uses the distraction to duck down and give her a hug. He inspects her outstretched hands, covered with brightly-colored bandaids. "You still have all your fingers? Well done!" 

"Here, I'll take that," says Steve, giving up on Cecil and divesting Carlos of the pie. "Cecil, aren't you going to introduce us to the outsider?"

"Well, obviously," says Cecil. He slings an arm around Carlos' shoulders. "Everyone, this is Carlos, my scientist boyfriend!"

All three of them look at Carlos expectantly.

Then Abbie flinches and raises a hand to her right ear. She pulls out her hearing aid and taps it a few times until it stops whistling and spitting sparks. 

Carlos breathes out through his nose and sticks his hands in the pockets of his lab coat to steady them. He's being ridiculous: in the past two weeks he's faced off against a giant masked army, a gang of angry spirits, and a slightly smaller gang of fish-people with heavy weaponry. This is Cecil's family. Yes, it will suck if they reject him, but the night is still young and they're probably not even well-armed.

He musters up his most charming grin and says, "Hi."

Abbie’s look of suspicion fades a little, then disappears completely when he returns her jaunty salute.

"Carlos, this is Abbie, my sister,” says Cecil. “She went to the Night Vale Day School in, uh… nineteen… eighty…?”

“No, it was in ninety… ninety… uh…” Abbie frowns. “Well, there was definitely a nine in it… Anyway, this is Janis, my daughter.” 

"Hi! I saw you at Career Day," says Janis. "You were wearing a green shirt and I liked your volcano. Do you have any more grenades?"

"Not at the dinner table, sweetheart," says Abbie. 

"But _Mooooooooooom_ ," says Janis. There’s a brief flurry of gestures that Carlos doesn’t follow, but nevertheless conveys a certain universal sense of “Because I said so,” and “But you never let me have any fun!” It concludes with Janis accepting defeat in mostly good grace and only pouting a little. Abbie pats her on the head.

Steve Carlsberg coughs into his fist. Cecil looks pointedly away.

“Psst, Uncle Cecil!” whispers Janis. “You forgot Steve!”

Cecil lets out a sigh. "This is Steve Carlsberg," he says grudgingly. "He's certainly... present."

"It's nice to meet you," says Carlos.

"We'll see," says Abbie. She steps aside and gestures to the door.

“Abbie, is this really necessary?” asks Cecil.

“My house, my rules,” she says. She makes an impatient gesture at Carlos, which is when he realizes that she’s not going to invite him in.

Carlos braces himself and walks inside.

Crossing their threshold without permission is like pushing his way through a sheet of rubber covered in sandpaper. Regardless of how Cecil feels about his sister's husband, their family is strong enough to transform their house into a proper home; Carlos can barely sense a fraction of his power when he’s inside.

He tries to quash a rising wave of panic. It doesn't matter that he wasn't planning on using it: without his magic he feels unbalanced, exposed, disarmed. And if Abbie did this deliberately – what does she know? What is she going to do? What is she going to tell Cecil?

“How are you feeling, outsider?” asks Steve.

“His name,” says Cecil frostily, “Is _Carlos_. I _literally_ just told you that, Steve Carlsberg.”

“Oh, it looks like he’s fine, Steve,” says Abbie, and Carlos’ knees maybe wobble with a tiny bit of relief as everyone troops inside after him. “We wanted to make sure you were human or human-adjacent. I mean, who knows about you outsiders, right? Janis, put your uncle’s pie in the kitchen and go set the table.”

“But I want to see!”

“We’ll tell you about it later if it’s any good,” says Steve, handing her the pie. She sighs dramatically, but sets it in her lap and wheels herself out of the hall.

“See what?” asks Carlos warily.

“Your tour of the house!” says Steve. “Watch your step. Or, you know. Don’t.”

“Right this way!” says Abbie, walking backwards through the doorway.

Carlos looks at Cecil.

"You’ve got good reflexes," he says. “You'll do _great_.”

Somehow, Carlos is not comforted.

“This is the living room,” says Abbie as soon as he follows her cautiously through the door. “Almost everyone we’ve entertained here has been alive, and the carpeting is original to the house.” She’s signing along with what sounds like a memorized speech, and is still walking backward, like a tour guide. “Cecil did those watercolors on the wall—”

“You can paint?” asks Carlos, temporarily distracted from scanning the room for threats.

Cecil blushes. “I mean, a _little_. I haven’t done it in ages. Not since… uh…”

“Hmm,” says Abbie. “Well, those were from my birthday in… how many years older than me are you?”

“You’re older,” says Cecil. “I think.”

“No, I’m pretty sure it’s you,” says Abbie.

“Well, like Carlos always says, _time doesn't even work_ ,” says Cecil. “But you’re definitely older. Anyway, I don’t think I’ve painted anything since Janis was born.”

“Why not?” asks Steve. “These are great!”

“I – I don’t remember,” says Cecil. He sounds sad, and a little lost. Carlos gives his hand a reassuring squeeze.

“So!” says Abbie. “Moving on. The obscure shape behind that black shroud on the wall is actually a mirror, but we have it covered since Cecil’s over. Nobody’s really sure where it came from. That stuffed moose head is a family heirloom. Legend has it that the moose was shot by Lee Marvin himself, when he passed through Night Vale during the Gold Rush. Now, if you’ll follow me through the front hall towards the back of the house—”

She freezes at Carlos’ frantic _Look out!_ , but loses her balance and starts to fall. 

Carlos lunges forward and grabs her arm, pulling her upright. They both look down at the trip wire stretching across the hallway behind her.

Abbie touches her fingers to her lips and shrugs him off, politely. “Dear, I thought I asked you to put the trip wire in the laundry room,” she says to Steve.

“No, I’m pretty sure you said the back hallway,” says Steve.

“That was last month when the exterminator came,” she says.

“Oh, you’re right,” says Steve. “Sorry. I had re-education on… uh…”

“Wednesday,” says Abbie.

“And you know how the electroshock therapy just throws me for a loop!” Steve laughs uproariously, for just a few seconds too long to be entirely comfortable. “Good catch, outsider!”

“Good catch, Carlos,” says Cecil loudly, as if Steve hadn’t said anything. “You certainly have the reaction time of a trustworthy person or entity. I bet you’ll have no problems with the rest of the gauntlet.” He winks.

“A _gauntlet_ ,” says Carlos, then, “Wow. For me? You shouldn’t have.”

“It was no trouble,” says Abbie. 

~*~*~*~

Two more trip wires, three snares, a pitfall, and what he assumed was a pair of caltrops (but turned out to be Janis’ murderball hubcap spikes that she’d left lying around) later, Carlos is actually feeling pretty good about the way the evening’s going. Booby traps he can handle, and it's a lot easier to remain calm when he's actually in a life-or-death situation (more or less) instead of just feeling like he's in one. 

That's probably a little fucked up, but at least Carlos isn't the one with a giant hole in the floor of his guest bedroom. It’s wheelchair accessible, but still.

“Here it is,” says Steve proudly, opening the last door in hallway. "I call it _the command center_.”

“ _I_ call it his serial killer room,” says Abbie. “He’s not a serial killer, to be clear. He just looks like one.”

Privately, Carlos agrees with her. The walls of the room are completely plastered in blurry photographs and newspaper cuttings; he has to duck under all the lengths of colored string connecting them to title cards labelled things like, “Hollow earth an inside job??” and “Government fracking linked to vaccinations.”

“You let him move it out of the basement?” Cecil asks Abbie disapprovingly. 

"It was a favor to Officer Dan," says Abbie. "His knees aren't what they used to be, and he's always so good about alphabetizing everything he confiscates." 

"Yeah, it really saves time when I get it back from the evidence lock-up!" says Steve. "Right, Dan?" He bangs on the wall twice.

There's an echoing pair of thumps from outside the house.

“Anywho, it's all here," says Steve. "Definite proof of all the things the government _doesn’t want you to know_. Minus the stuff that's still in police custody." 

“We all need our hobbies,” Abbie sighs.

“It’s not a hobby!” says Steve. “It’s the truth!” 

“You got your corkboards and string at the craft store, Steve,” says Abbie. “In the Evidence Gathering aisle.”

“Well, that’s a good point,” says Steve. “I guess it’s a hobby _and_ the truth.”

“Flip-flopping again,” says Cecil, shaking his head.

“Not me!” says Steve. “Everyone knows that flip-flops cause cancer. Oh, do you like those? They’re some of my best evidence!” 

He gestures towards the index card Carlos was looking at, the one labelled MAGIC BULLET – FOUND ON HOLLOWS RD followed by a black censor bar. Taped to it are two silver bullets. They’ve been deformed by impact, but if Carlos had to guess he’d say they were .50 cals fired from a semi-automatic pistol, not a rifle. He’d also guess that the silver was melted down from a collection of amazingly tacky jewelry first assembled almost two hundred years ago for the sole purpose of being passed down to the owner’s descendants in case they needed to make ammo, and that the shooter was of medium height with great hair and only missed his target because he wiped out in a marble spill. Fortunately, so had the loup-garou.

“Evidence of what?” asks Carlos, morbidly curious.

“That the FBI has been _infiltrated by werewolves_ ,” says Steve. “I’ve got a video somewhere—”

"Later, honey," says Abbie firmly. "Dinner should be almost ready. Why don't we all take turns washing up in... _the bathroom_?"

"Sounds great," says Carlos, ignoring the significant glances everyone is giving him. 

Unsurprisingly, they let him go first, although Cecil does at least squeeze his hand for good luck. Carlos gathers in the sad remains of his power and inspects the door. It's slightly ajar; when he looks up, he can see a small bucket balanced on the top. He sighs and reaches for the doorknob.

His phone alarm goes off.

"Excuse me a second," he says. "I just need to—"

He stares at the screen, then back at the bathroom door.

"What is it?" asks Cecil.

"It's the Geiger counter app," says Carlos. "Abbie, Steve – is your bathroom _supposed_ to be radioactive?"

"Wow, you can tell?" asks Steve. 

"It's because he's a _scientist_ ," says Cecil. "I _told_ you."

"Yes, yes," says Abbie. "Fine, you were right."

"... _Why_ is your bathroom radioactive?" asks Carlos, because as nice as it is to know that Cecil has been defending him to his family, there are some more pressing issues at hand.

"Don't worry, it's probably just the depleted uranium," says Abbie.

" _Depleted uranium_ ," repeats Carlos.

"And iron filings," says Abbie. "Some powdered bloodstone, basil..."

Carlos gapes at her, because it sounds like she's describing—

"It's an old family recipe for ghost dust," she says. "You can never be too careful. Sometimes my clients try to follow me home."

"Uh, Mom? Steve?"

"Janis wants us, dear," says Steve.

"We'll be in in just a minute, sweetheart!" Abbie calls, which is when the smoke detector goes off with a piercing series of beeps and flashes.

"Oh, shitknuckles!" she says. "The steak!"

~*~*~*~

"Thank you for carrying that," says Abbie. She props the last window open with a stone idol so the last of the smoke can disperse, then opens the basement door for Carlos. 

He shifts the – now thankfully sealed – bucket of ghost dust in his arms. It's not big, but it's heavy. " _De nada_ ," he says.

Abbie taps her chin with one finger, and he realizes he still has a surgical mask obscuring his mouth. He shifts the bucket until he has a hand free, pulls the mask down, and repeats himself so she can read his lips.

"So depleted uranium's toxic, huh?" she says, following him downstairs. He's watching the steps carefully, in case this is another test, but the basement is pretty well lit and it doesn't seem to contain any more booby traps. A few pieces of red string hang limply from the corkboard walls.

He heads towards the shelf in the corner after she points it out. "Yes, like mercury or arsenic. It's bad for your kidneys," he says, after he carefully sets the bucket down. "It's not very radioactive, but it can also cause problems if insoluble particles get in your body – like, say, if a bucket full of its dust gets dumped on your head. And they're not sure about the long-term side-effects."

"Who knew?" says Abbie philosophically, pulling off her surgical mask and dropping in the hazmat disposal bin. Carlos follows suit. "C'mon, I think Steve should be just about done with dinner 2.0."

He's not, but he did set out some scones for them to snack on. Janis is giggling at Cecil, whose plate contains what _used_ to be a scone before it was flattened by a blunt object, like a fist thumped against it for emphasis.

"Here, let me get you another one!" says Steve.

"No, that's—"

Steve flips another scone onto Cecil's plate. "Gotta go check on the hot dogs!" he says, and bustles back to the kitchen.

Cecil grabs it and draws his arm back to hurl it after Steve, but Carlos steals it out of his hand and takes a big bite as he sits down.

Cecil gives him a look of absolute betrayal.

"How is it?" asks Abbie casually. 

Too casually.

Carlos stops chewing and stares at both of them. Then he stares at Janis, who has widened her eyes and puffed up her cheeks like a chipmunk, until he realizes she's mimicking his expression.

He swallows with some difficulty – the scone tastes delicious, but it's little dry. "It's pretty good," he says. "Definitely the best scone I've had today."

"But you haven't had any oth– oh!" says Cecil, and taps his nose slyly when Abbie turns to wipe crumbs off Janis' chin. Carlos rolls his eyes at him, but in an affectionate way.

"I like Steve's scones," says Janis. "Especially the orange ones. I eat them with bean curd. Can you make scones?"

"I don't know," says Carlos. "I've never tried. I don't do a lot of baking."

"Why not?"

"I don't have a lot of time," says Carlos. "And most of my recipes use flour." At Janis' uncomprehending expression, he adds, "It's made of wheat."

"Ohhhhh," she says. “What else has wheat?”

“A lot of breads,” says Carlos. “And cereals. Cookies. Pasta." 

"What else?"

"Uh, fish sticks," says Carlos. "Sausages. Sauces that use wheat starch as a stabilizer. Imitation cheese—”

"Does imitation cheese repeat everything you say, like a parrot? Or a horned toad? Or a rock from the Sand Wastes?"

"No, it's just made a different way from regular cheese, but it tastes the same." His conscience compels him to add, "Sort of."

"Have you ever eaten it?"

"When I had to."

Janis nods seriously. “Have you ever eaten a snake?”

"Not that I know of," says Carlos.

"Why can't we eat wheat?"

“Don’t ask so many questions, Janis,” says Abbie a little sharply.

“Sorry,” says Janis, eyes downcast. She pokes at the crumbs on her plate.

“I don’t actually mi—” Carlos jumps as Cecil’s foot connects with his ankle.

“Don’t talk about the q-word!” Cecil hisses from behind his hand.

“That’s rude, Cecil,” says Abbie with a frown. "If you can't say it to the whole table—”

"All righty! Who wants food?"

"I do!" shouts Janis, shame forgotten.

"Indoor voice, Janis," says Steve easily as he sets a saucepan on the table. "Don't worry, there'll be enough for everyone. How were the scones?"

"The outsider said they were the best," says Abbie, and this time Carlos kicks Cecil in the calf to keep him from correcting her.

"Really? Wow!" says Steve. "You know, they say it's bad luck for two bakers to get married, but I think we do all right."

"You bake?" Carlos asks Abbie.

"She makes pies, just like Uncle Cecil!" says Janis. " _Just like him_."

"We won the Double Pie contest one year with Mom's invisible pie recipe," says Abbie. "Or was it Mother's recipe?"

"I thought it was _your_ mother's recipe," says Cecil. 

"No, that can't be right, she wasn't allowed to use ovens," says Abbie. They both frown at each other in consternation. 

"Weird! Here, give me your plate, outsider," says Steve. He slops a ladleful of something intensely orange onto Carlos' plate and hands it back. "I'll admit it's not as good as my scones—”

Cecil snorts.

"But I do make a pretty mean mac and cheese hot dog skillet, if I do say so myself," Steve finishes. "Sorry we don't have anything fancier. After we lost the steak and polenta, it was this or raw light red kidney beans."

"There was a sale," says Abbie.

Carlos pokes a slice of hot dog. "It's fine, this looks... really interesting. And full of gluten-free imitation cheese."

" _Cool_ ," says Janis.

"Carlos is an _excellent_ cook," says Cecil smugly. 

"It must be nice to have more than two different cooked meals for dinner," says Abbie wistfully. "We're still holding out hope for Janis, though. You should see her chop vegetables."

"And my pinky!" says Janis, holding up the bandaged finger proudly. 

Carlos takes a bite while everyone is distracted. It's not _bad_ , really; all the preservatives add an interesting dimension to the flavor.

There's a few moments of peaceful silence as everyone concentrates on their food, but soon enough Carlos feels the back of his neck prickle under the weight of curious gazes. He glances at Cecil, in case they're staring because he's chewing too loudly or something. But Cecil just gives him an encouraging eyebrow waggle.

"So," says Carlos, and casts around for a safe topic of discussion. What do people even talk about?

They already know Cecil – obviously – and Carlos would prefer not to talk about himself when he's so clearly an outsider, and also because of all the misdirection, half-truths, and blatant lies doing so might entail. Janis' education is out. Steve Carlsberg is _definitely_ out. 

"Where do you work that you need so much gho– depleted uranium?" he asks Abbie.

"Pine Cliff," she says. "It's pretty haunted. After a while you learn how to deal with it, but sometimes the locals get restless. I always bring my bell and candle, too. You can't always depend on someone else being around to help you out."

"Sounds like a real ghost town," says Carlos, deadpan. Janis giggles. Cecil and Steve both chuckle, although Cecil stops as soon as he realizes Steve is doing the same thing and glares at him instead. Abbie lets out a honking laugh and flutters her fingers in front of her chest. 

"You're funny," she says. "I like that."

"What do you do in Pine Cliff?" asks Carlos. Abbie's not a practitioner, as far as he knows, but it's possible she has a very minor talent she's made good use of.

"Oh, I'm an accountant," she says. 

“…An accountant,” repeats Carlos. 

Abbie nods, echoing the motion with her fist. "Estate planning," she says. 

"That's how we met!" says Steve. 

“You needed a CPA?” asks Carlos, now completely lost.

“No, I was investigating reports that the citizens of Pine Cliff were being manipulated by the cryptofascist shadowocracy to weaken the barriers between our dimensions, and also property values," says Steve.

Abbie shakes her head fondly. "I had to save him from an angry mob," she says.

"They didn't understand," says Steve. "Pine Cliff doesn't have the glowing arrows in the sky, not like Night Vale. And sure, they were pretty upset from the dark magic digging into their ghostly flesh and slowly driving them mad, but I think it was mostly because they didn't know the truth."

"What glowing arrows?" asks Carlos. 

" _Exactly_ ," Cecil scoffs.

"I've been trying to tell Cecil about them ever since we became lay brothers," says Steve sadly. "But he doesn't believe me. It's not just the arrows – there's dotted lines, and circles, and – and everything! It's all part of some vast, nearly comprehensible pattern – a great chart that explains it all – stretching all over Night Vale. We just have to figure out what it _says_."

"These arrows," says Carlos. "And dotted lines and circles. Would you say they form... patterns?"

Steve blinks at him, then says, "They _do_!" 

"Not you, too, Carlos!" says Cecil despairingly.

"I don't know if we should be talking about this in front of Janis, Steve," says Abbie, sounding very uncomfortable.

"It's all right, Abbie," says Steve. "One day everyone will know about the arrows and lines and circles, and the way they cling together in little, uh. Sickles? Signals?"

"Sigils?" asks Carlos, with a sinking feeling.

Steve nods enthusiastically. "—All moving together in the paths of great – you know, they've got five points, kind of like a star but with less void—"

"Pentacles," says Carlos unhappily.

"—And those all part of some greater pattern. One day I'll figure out what it means. One day everything will _make sense_!"

Carlos stares at him in dismay. 

There _are_ shapes in the sky – not visible in the normal way, but readily apparent if you have the Sight, or a knack for seeing things people would prefer you didn't. They _do_ form patterns, and the patterns mean something.

But the wards that surround and protect Night Vale don't explain the world. They're powerful, and beautiful, but they're not some great truth. They're not worth the scorn of your fellow citizens. They're not worth getting your teeth metaphorically kicked in every time you open your mouth to ask a question. They're not worth having your mind violated, literally, because you believe in something bigger than a boot to the face and will never give up trying to find out what it is. 

All they mean is that Night Vale has been under the watch of powerful beings who have been secretly interfering with the town for centuries, not so much for Night Vale's own good as for the good of everyone else in the world. The only person those shapes should be that important to is the undercover secret operative who maintains them, who is currently sitting across from Steve Carlsberg and regretting eating so many hot dog wheels.

"What if they don't mean anything?" asks Carlos. "What if they're just... there? Like, I don't know... the clouds, or the helpful warning signs?"

"What would be the point of that?" asks Steve.

Carlos suppresses a wince. "To protect you," he says, a little weakly.

"You can't protect someone if you don't tell them the _truth_ ," says Steve.

"Yes, you can," says Cecil. He thumps his fist on the table. "That is exactly what protecting someone _is_. Some people can't handle the truth! Steve Carlsberg, we live in a world that has walls. And those walls have to be guarded by men and women and others with deadly poisoned blow darts—”

"No movie quotes at the dinner table, Cecil," says Abbie.

"You can't just raise someone to know all the truth _all the time_ ," says Cecil. "It's irresponsible."

"Yeah?" says Steve. "Yeah? Well, better irresponsible then ignorant of the truth that fish-people are infiltrating our cities one by one and kidnapping _American citizens_ to be their mind slaves!"

"Nobody's _that_ ignorant, Steve Carlsberg!"

"No thanks to you!"

"Me? _Me_? You're the one who refuses to believe that the lizard-kings and their pseudo-democracy—”

"The lizard-kings and their pseudo-democracy are just a front for criminal empires selling mystically-enhanced hallucinogenic drugs that destroy your psyche!"

Abbie covers her face with one hand. Then she reaches up, turns off her hearing aids, and goes back to eating in peace.

Janis shovels down her macaroni as fast as she can and signs something to her mother. Abbie nods, and Janis collects her plate and wheels out of the dining room.

Carlos stares down at his hot dogs and tries not feel complicit in ruining Steve Carlsberg's life.

"—and their secret government bunkers—"

"Those aren't secret! City Council had a beef and beer fundraiser for the _express purpose_ of building them!"

As soon as Abbie stands, Carlos leaps up and grabs as many dishes he can carry. He follows her into the kitchen, but she swats at him when he tries to help put them in the dishwasher.

Unfortunately, the single swinging door between kitchen and dining room doesn't do much to muffle the raised voices.

"You – you – _mountain believer_!"

"You take that back!"

"They'll be a while," says Abbie resignedly. She points out the window. "Can you go watch Janis? There's a birds-of-prey helicopter watch in effect."

"For sure," says Carlos, then nods when he remembers she hasn't turned her hearing aids back on.

She gives him a weary smile and starts to rinse off dishes.

~*~*~*~

The rush of his magic returning almost stops Carlos in his tracks when he lets himself out the garage door. He braces himself against the wall as energy floods through him and power surges through his veins. It’s even better than an adrenaline rush: clearing his head, pushing him to action, even damping his anxieties until they’re just a prickle of hyper-awareness.

He resists the urge to cut loose, though he does vault over the railing instead of walking sedately down the ramp.

Janis is near the end of the driveway, throwing a knife at the lone wooden fence post in the back yard. Her form's pretty good, but she's having a hard time hitting the target. When she does, the knife is just as likely to ricochet off in random directions than stick in the wood.

The frustration finally catches up to her; Carlos watches as her throws become more and more forceful, until finally the knife sails over the post and lands in the middle of some sinister-looking shrubbery.

"Need a hand?" he asks.

She sighs. "Yes, please," she mutters. Carlos fishes her knife out of a thorny bush, which tries and fails to catch the sleeve of his lab coat.

He hefts the knife with a frown. It's only about six ounces and the center of gravity is pretty high up the blade. 

He hands it back to her handle first. "Did you pick that out?" he asks. 

"No, my troop leader gave it to me," says Janis. "It's because I'm the smallest. Why?"

"It's a little light," says Carlos. He hesitates: he's been banned from teaching any of his younger family members knife tricks until they're at least sixteen years old. But Abbie and Steve clearly know and approve of Janis' hobby, and she's about the age he was when his _bisabuela_ first started teaching _him_ , so...

"Do you want to try an experiment?" he asks.

Her eyes light up. "With grenades?"

"No, with throwing knives," he says.

She considers the matter seriously. "Okay," she says.

He pulls out his left boot knife. "I'll trade you. Try throwing this."

She takes it carefully. "It feels different," she says.

Carlos nods. "It's center-balanced, but you should still be able throw it by the handle. It's a little heavier, too."

"Thank you," she says. "Okay, stand back."

She waits until he retreats a few feet, then says, "Don't take your eye off the knife."

"I won't," says Carlos.

"Are you wearing protective footwear?"

"Yes," says Carlos. He suppresses a smile; he doesn't want to discourage the one person in Night Vale who actually pays attention to safety precautions.

Janis' first throw hits the post handle-first. But after she adjusts for the new rotation, the next three throws sink into the wood and stay there.

"You fixed it!" she says delightedly. 

"Not me," says Carlos, and this time he does smile. "When a knife is lighter than 200g – that's about seven ounces – it's more susceptible to crosswinds and impacts the target with much less force—"

Janis is staring at him politely, but blankly.

"It can get blown off course, and it won't hit as hard so it's less likely to stick," Carlos translates. “You were doing everything correctly; you just needed a better knife to start learning with.”

"Ohhh," says Janis. She pulls the knife free and balances the flat of the blade on her finger. "What's the center balance do?"

Carlos debates trying to explain the complexities of angular momentum to someone in elementary school and decides against it, at least for now. "It means the knife rotates in a nice circle when you throw it," he says. "And you can practice both handle and blade grips, since both ends have equal weight."

"Cool!" says Janis, still balancing the knife on her finger. It wobbles alarmingly. Carlos eyes her bandages in all their eldritch kawaii glory and plucks it off before it falls.

"Aw, it's okay," says Janis, though she doesn't move to take it back. "I don't even have pain receptors. Cuts just mean there's more merit in your merit badge."

"You can't throw a knife if you don't have any fingers," Carlos points out.

"I could learn telekinesis?" she says hopefully. 

"That's a completely different throwing method," says Carlos. "But in the meantime..." He slips the knife back into its sheath, then draws the matching blade from his other boot. 

There's a half-used roll of duct tape in the pocket of his lab coat. He tapes up the edges and point of the knife and hands it to Janis, who immediately pokes it to see if it will cut her.

Carlos likes kids, don't get him wrong, but it seems like it would be really stressful to have to watch them _all the time_.

"Practice handling that one," he says. "You can work on switching hands and changing your grips, too." He gives her the other knife, sheath and all. "Use that one for throwing. When you re-sharpen it, just do the point."

"You can keep mine," says Janis graciously. "When I'm really good, we can trade back."

"Deal," says Carlos. They shake on it.

Both of them startle when a door slams inside the house. It's followed by several seconds of muffled shouting, then sullen silence.

"Mom probably made Uncle Cecil go sit on the basement steps again," says Janis.

"Does that happen a lot?" asks Carlos. 

He immediately regrets the question, but Janis just shrugs. "Mostly he just makes faces," she says. "You don't get put in timeout for that."

She balances the handle of the taped knife on the end of her finger. After a few seconds it falls harmlessly in her lap.

"Do scientists ask questions?" she asks, with a sidelong glance at Carlos.

"Yes," he says. "And then they test things until they find some answers. That's pretty much a scientist's job."

"Mom doesn't like it when I ask too many questions," she says. "She says that's why Steve and Uncle Cecil always fight, because _Steve_ asks too many questions. But I listen to Uncle Cecil on the radio and he asks questions _all the time_. Sometimes he talks to people and that's all he does! And I know he loves me anyway. And you ask questions and he loves _you_. So I don't get why it's a problem."

"Uh," says Carlos, momentarily thrown by a second-grader casually evaluating his relationship.

Then Janis says, "Steve gets into trouble a lot. They try not to let me notice, but I do." 

She looks down at her lap. She doesn't ask any more questions.

It’s none of his business, probably. Janis isn’t his niece and she’s not one of his rookies. Her parents would almost certainly feel that's it's not his place to say anything.

Then again, if they wanted him to know his place, they probably shouldn’t have been calling him ‘outsider’ all evening.

"It's because people are scared of the answers Steve might find," says Carlos.

"They're scared of _Steve_?" says Janis. "But Steve is like the most not-scary person _ever_."

"People do stupid things when they're scared," says Carlos. "And then others get hurt."

"Like stampede in the cafeteria," says Janis, nodding.

"...Yes, like that," says Carlos.

Janis ventures a knife flip and only fumbles the catch a little. "So my mom is scared of Steve?"

"She's scared _for_ Steve," says Carlos. "And then she gets scared for you, because she wants you to be safe."

"So is Uncle Cecil," says Janis. "He's always talking about ear poison. At first I thought he meant like in Miss Cactus Jane's puppet shows, but then I figured out he means all the stuff Steve tells me." She flips the knife again and grabs the handle in an icepick grip. "I don't want to get hurt, but... I just want to _know_ things," she finishes plaintively.

"Questions are like knives," says Carlos. "You have to learn how to use them correctly so you don’t injure yourself or others."

Janis tilts her head. "So I shouldn't use them on people unless I'm prepared to hurt or kill them?"

"Sometimes," says Carlos. "It depends on the question."

"That is pretty scary, I guess," says Janis. "I'll have to be careful when I practice."

"Good," says Carlos.

"So... can I ask _you_ a question?" Her face screws up. "Can I ask you three questions, counting this one and the last one?"

Carlos smiles. "Sure."

She points at the fence post. "Can you hit that?"

What that question really amounts to is whether he’s the kind of person who will show off to impress small children, but the answer either way is _yes_ , so.

"Let's test it out," he says. 

They've progressed all the way to moving targets when Carlos feels a prickle on the back of his neck.

"Pull!" shouts Janis, and fires a wooden target disk from her slingshot. Carlos releases just a second too late; the knife's aim is true, but it over-rotates and knocks the disk out of the sky instead of impaling it.

He glances towards the garage. Cecil sits on the ramp with his legs dangling over the side – a tad sullenly, by the set of his shoulders, but he waves when he sees Carlos looking. Abbie and Steve are by the door, arms around each others' waists. 

"You missed," calls Abbie. 

"He only gets five points for that one," says Janis, carefully stowing her slingshot so she can repeat herself in sign. 

Cecil ducks under the railing and hops off the ramp, setting off for the last known location of knife and target. Abbie and Steve follow at a more sedate pace.

"What's my score now?" asks Carlos. 

"Eleven billion," says Janis. 

"Sounds right to me!" says Cecil, emerging from the bushes mostly unscathed. He gives the target to Janis, but before he hands Carlos the knife he pulls Carlos in for an _extremely_ congratulatory kiss. 

"I, uh," says Carlos. He can feel himself blushing furiously, a situation which is not helped by Cecil wrapping his arm around Carlos' waist and sticking his hand in the pocket of Carlos' lab coat. "Th-thanks." 

"That means you're almost as good as a Girl Scout Ambassador!" says Janis. "But you're not _as_ good, because you won't finish your fruit-stabbing requirement.”

“I’m not knocking an apple off your head with a knife until you’re at least sixteen,” says Carlos. He looks hastily at her parents and adds, “Or, uh – never.”

“ _Pleeeeeeease_ ,” says Janis, turning nuclear-grade sad llama eyes against all adults present. 

Abbie says something in reply, but Carlos has been distracted by the way Steve moves his arm from Abbie's waist to her shoulder; more specifically, he's been distracted by the way Cecil mirrors the movement almost simultaneously, except that he makes a point to haul Carlos in tightly against his side, and Carlos has the nasty suspicion he's somehow become a pawn in an entirely one-sided PDA grudge match.

“It’s okay, Janis!” says Steve. “You can watch him knock an apple off my head instead.”

“Wait, what?” says Carlos.

“That sounds like an _excellent_ idea,” says Cecil with great relish.

“Wow, thanks, Cecil!” says Steve. “I’ll go get one.” He takes off for the house.

“I didn’t say that to be nice to you!” Cecil shouts after him. 

Cecil still has his arm around Carlos’ shoulders, even though Steve has left Abbie behind. Carlos tries to make himself relax. It's not that big of a deal, really. So what if Cecil brought him here to dodge booby traps and field awkward conversations and throw knives at human targets? Cecil's just... showing him off to his family, to... make a point. 

About how he's so much better than Steve Carlsberg. 

That’s… not ideal, but it’s fine. Carlos is fine.

Abbie ruffles Janis’ hair. “Steve spoils you rotten, kiddo,” she says. 

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Carlos asks her.

Abbie shrugs. “Steve’s a grown man with a mostly titanium skull,” she says. “I’m sure he’ll be okay.”

The garage door bangs open and Steve reappears a few seconds later. “We’re out of apples,” he says. “But we’ve got a watermelon and this carton of blueber—”

“ _Watermelon_ ,” says Carlos as Cecil opens his mouth to weigh in.

When Abbie puts her hand on Steve's shoulder as he tries to balance a watermelon on his head, Cecil tries to pull Carlos' onto _his_ shoulder, and that's the last straw.

"Can I talk to you a second?" says Carlos brightly. He does not put Cecil in a headlock, because retaliation is not a healthy response in a relationship, but he does grip Cecil’s tunic a little tighter than necessary as he pulls him off to the side.

"If this about the watermelon, I just want you to know that no matter what happens, I'll still love you," says Cecil. He taps his nose conspiratorily.

Carlos scowls at him, even as his traitorous heart skips a beat. "Nothing's going to happen, Cecil," he says.

"Oh, I know!" says Cecil. "I'm sure your aim is perfect. I'm just saying that if it's not _quite_ as perfect as it could be, I'd be totally okay with it. So, just... don't get too stressed out about precision and accuracy and stuff."

“I am not going to _stab Steve Carlsberg in the face_!”

"Geez, of course not," says Cecil, irritation creeping into his tone. "That would really upset Janis. What kind of uncle do you think I am? I was just talking about winging him in the ear a little."

Carlos resists throwing up his hands, because he's still holding Janis' throwing knife and _unlike some people_ he cares about not endangering the safety of _everyone_ around him.

"Look," he says. "Apart from the booby traps, and refusing to call me by my name, and making me eat a second helping of hot dogs, Steve has been perfectly polite all evening and I'd like to return the favor. So I'd really appreciate it if you could keep a lid on your hostility for _five minutes_ and stop dragging me into your – your vendetta!"

"It's actually a feud, since although I have right of blood I can't—"

"That is _not the point_ ," says Carlos.

Cecil opens his mouth, changes his mind, and shuts it again. "You're really upset," he says. "Why? It's just Steve Carlsberg."

"I know you don't like him, but he's still part of your _family_ , Cecil," says Carlos. "And I'd prefer if they don't regret ever meeting me in the first place, because this is kind of a big deal, and—"

"It is?" Cecil interrupts.

"What?"

Cecil puts both his hands on Carlos’ shoulders and inspects his face for a moment. Then he sighs. “I can see it means a lot to you. Fine. I’ll do it."

"You'll – what?" asks Carlos, wrong-footed by the sudden shift in the conversation.

"I'll _be polite_ to Steve Carlsberg,” says Cecil, nose screwed up. “Temporarily. Because you asked."

"I – okay," says Carlos. “Thank you."

Cecil's hands are still on Carlos' shoulders; he squeezes them reassuringly. "You don't have to be nervous," he says. "You already passed the standard Newcomer Gauntlet, and hardly anyone fills out the Familial Acceptance and Approval forms right away. _Especially_ not Abbie. She hates paperwork so much she didn't even introduce Steve until the wedding. Of course, after that we had to file a whole supplementary appendix, because Steve Carlsberg is ter—" He cuts himself off and finishes, haltingly, "...Terrific... at... creating paperwork...?"

"Don't hurt yourself," sighs Carlos.

"You're doing great," says Cecil. "But I'd be proud of you no matter what."

He smiles at Carlos, and Carlos feels the remains of his defensiveness melt away. His confusion remains, but that's nothing new. Then Cecil leans in and kisses him, and it's not for show, or for vengeance, or for an audience at all. It's gentle and a little sloppy and just for Carlos.

"Good luck," says Cecil.

Carlos hits the target dead on. He does not stab Steve Carlsberg in the face. They eat the watermelon with dessert.

~*~*~*~

The evening begins to wind down when Janis nods off and faceplants right in her invisible pie crust. Cecil wheels her down the hall to help her get ready for bed; her protests that she’s not even _tired_ keep trailing off into yawns. Steve disappears into the kitchen with the rest of the dishes, leaving Carlos alone with Abbie.

“You’re supposed to look people in the eye when you speak to them, you know,” she says.

“I don't like looking people in the eye,” says Carlos. 

She frowns, but in a contemplative way. After a moment she nods her head.

"Smart," she says. "You can see all sorts of nasty stuff that way. I'm the same about hand blades – they remind me too much of the Time of Knives." She shudders. "Vomit."

Carlos looks around for a bucket or something. But it seems to be an expression rather than a prediction, since she continues, "Thank you for helping Janis," without any noticeable discomfort.

" _De nada_ ," says Carlos. "She's a sweet kid. Good aim, too."

"Yeah," says Abbie. "I just hope it's enough. You didn't give her all your good knives, did you?"

"No, I've got some more," says Carlos.

"Sensible," says Abbie. "You should be able to get Cecil home all right." She shakes her head. "Sometimes I worry about him; he doesn't have the sense he was born with. Nobody's really sure where it's gone..."

She nudges a watermelon seed around her plate, then says, a little challengingly, "Shame about you being an outsider, though."

Carlos just shrugs.

"Hmm," says Abbie. "Well... I guess you'll do."

"Do?" asks Carlos.

"For Cecil," she says. 

"I, uh. Oh," says Carlos. "...Thanks."

She stares at him for a moment, then lets out a snorting laugh. "Sorry," she says. "I'm not used to having an opinion. We were raised pretty traditionally, you know. Sneaking out at night... sneaking out in the morning... sneaking out after school... Just leaving the house was dangerous, and it wasn't really safe to bring people around, right? We had to watch each other's backs. Cecil refused to acknowledge my existence to anyone outside the family, and if he didn't talk about someone for at least twenty minutes every evening for a month, I didn't even ask. We respected each other's privacy."

"That sounds..." Sweet, yet terrifying. Like most of Night Vale, really.

"Yeah," says Abbie. "So now you're here, and I know how you got in, and I know what you want. And I don't really know what to do with that."

_Me, either_ , thinks Carlos.

"Still," she says. "Having _all_ the answers would be dangerous, and at least I don't have to fill out the forms yet. I think this is the part where I'm supposed to threaten you."

"Threaten me?"

"To be good to Cecil," Abbie clarifies.

"Oh, right," says Carlos. "Go ahead."

She leans across the table and succeeds in catching his eye for a fraction of a second. "If you break his heart through malice or carelessness, I will feed your blood to the ghosts," she says. She repeats it in sign; her gestures are emphatic and quite graphic.

"That seems fair," says Carlos.

"Good," says Abbie. "I'm glad we got that settled... Carlos." It’s the first time she’s said his name all evening.

Then she gives him two thumbs down. But before Carlos can panic, she uses her thumbs to draw a few alternating circles in the air, then ends with a double slice towards the ground. “That’s you. Now you’ll know when we’re talking about you.”

“Thanks, Abbie,” says Carlos. “I think.”

Steve pops his head in from the kitchen. "Are we talking about Janis? I heard you talking about Janis. Isn't she the best?"

"Train's gone, sorry," says Abbie with a smile. "Steve, why don't you take the outsi– _Carlos_ to disable the spike strip, so he and Cecil can leave?"

"Okeydokey!" says Steve. "C'mon, I'll show you the control booth."

Most of the property's not inconsiderable defenses are automated. Fortunately, they also have back-up manual controls, which come in handy when Steve turns to Carlos halfway through lowering the road spikes and says, "I know who you are."

The control panel lets out a few sparks and the spikes freeze half-upright, but Carlos manages to keep his expression calm. "Well, we did just meet a couple hours ago," he says.

"No," says Steve. " _I know who you are_."

"Who?" asks Carlos.

Steve squints at him for a moment, then deflates. 

"I don't know who you are," he says. "I was hoping that telling you I did would trick you into revealing your secret identity."

"What if I don't have a secret identity?"

"Everyone does eventually," says Steve. "I can tell. They're all just waiting for the signal, and then—" He makes a noise halfway between _ka-pow!_ and a vacuum cleaner imploding. "—They'll activate and perform the nefarious action that they had been planted years ago to perform. Like… Cecil, for instance."

He stares at Carlos hopefully.

"Cecil doesn't have a secret identity," says Carlos.

"Darn it," says Steve. "Guess I'll have to figure it out on my own. Like everything else."

Carlos thinks of Janis and her duct tape. "Just… be careful," he says.

Steve blinks at him. "Huh," he says. 

As they crank the handle to lower the road spikes all the way down, he adds, "You know, you're not bad, for an outsider. Would you like some scones to take home?"

"For sure," says Carlos. "That would be nice."

He gives Carlos a big Tupperware container full of them as they're getting ready to leave. Cecil eyes it dubiously, but bites his tongue. Literally. It's sticking out of his mouth and makes him look like a petulant toddler, but Carlos guesses it's the thought that counts.

"Thank you for dinner," he says to Abbie and Steve. "I had a nice time."

"Thank you for not shunning Carlos," says Cecil. "Especially _you_ , Ste– hmmm. Just... especially everyone in this house, with no one singled out even though they probably deserve it."

"Sure thing, Cecil!" says Steve. "Any time." He slaps Cecil heartily on the shoulder.

Cecil's eye twitches.

"We should really be going," says Carlos. He puts a hand on Cecil's lower back and ushers him towards his sister before something dire happens, like his head exploding from bottled-up rage. 

Abbie kisses Cecil on the cheek and opens the door for both of them. "Good ni—"

The top step shifts underneath Carlos' foot. There's a hissing noise, and he barely gets the Tupperware up in time to intercept a blow dart headed directly towards Cecil's face. The second blow dart bounces harmlessly off the shoulder of his lab coat and gets stuck down the back of his collar.

"Whoops," says Steve. "Knew I forgot something."

"Sorry about that," says Abbie. "You already passed the gauntlet, but good catch! We're going to go make sure the rest of the booby traps have been disabled now."

"I'm sure I got the rest," says Steve. "Pretty sure."

"Have a good night," says Abbie firmly. She waves goodbye and shuts the door. 

Cecil reaches up and plucks the blow dart from Carlos' lab coat. He doesn’t say anything, but his expression is very… expressive.

"You can stop making yourself be polite now," says Carlos.

" _Ugh_ ," say Cecil. "I can't believe he – and at you – and after – _ugh_ , he's such a... such a _jerk_!" He hurls the dart violently into the night. Someone yelps.

"Sorry, Dan," says Cecil. He takes a deep breath, straightens his tunic, and smoothes his hair. "Okay," he says. "Okay. I feel better now." He looks at Carlos. "Are you ready to go?"

" _God_ , yes," says Carlos.

~*~*~*~

Carlos’ phone starts to ring before they've even made it halfway down the driveway. He looks at the caller ID and swears.

“I have to get this,” he says to Cecil, and answers the phone. “ _Ramirez est._ ”

“ _Linea haec munita estne_?”

“ _Ita est_ ,” says Carlos.

“ _Signum_?”

“ _Nova Britannia ius peloridum_ ,” answers Carlos, and pulls out his notebook and Sharpie as the Warden on the other end starts reading off the report.

Cecil steers him around the driveway’s disabled defenses while Carlos scribbles down notes. There’s not many of them. Most of the news is bad. He hangs up just as they reach the car.

“What’s wrong?” Cecil asks.

“Just… science,” says Carlos. “Our data is being altered by unknown and unscrupulous researchers we can’t track down. And I have to go to another conference in the middle of next month.”

Cecil sighs. “Well, at least I got you away from science for a few hours.” He doesn’t sound bitter, though, and the silence as they drive back to his apartment is a comfortable one.

"You know," says Cecil, when the ride’s almost through, "It's a shame you might miss Homecoming. I could introduce you to my mom."

Then he clutches at the handle above his door as Carlos swerves violently off the road and onto the shoulder.

"Or I could not do that, ever," he says, once they've come to a stop. "Carlos?"

"I'm fine," says Carlos. He rests his forehead against the steering wheel. "That's fine, I was just... surprised. Sorry."

"Are you sure?"

He shuts his eyes as Cecil reaches over and rubs the back of his neck. "It's just really... soon," he says. "I don't think..." He swallows. "I don't think I'm ready."

"Oh," says Cecil, then, " _Ohhhh_."

Carlos cracks an eye. Cecil does not appear like he's about to reject Carlos and leap out of the car rather than spend another second with him and his issues.

"Tonight was _too_ soon, wasn't it," says Cecil.

"No," says Carlos. "Yes. I don't know, it was fine."

"But you were unhappy," says Cecil. 

"You wanted me to meet your _family_ , Cecil," says Carlos. “I can count on one hand the number of my sisters' boyfriends who made it far enough to get invited to a family dinner. It's a... big deal."

"I can see that now," says Cecil. "I'm sorry, Carlos. I should have made sure you were okay with it." 

"It's all right." Carlos slumps back into his seat and rubs his face with both hands. "I like your family. I'm glad I met them."

"I'm glad, too," says Cecil. "I thought it would be easy. Abbie only likes getting to know people in person, and obviously I wanted you to meet Janis because she's the best. Steve Carlsberg, though – well, who cares what he thinks?"

" _I_ do," says Carlos. "What if Abbie and Janis didn't like me because I was rude to him?"

"How could they not like you?" asks Cecil. He sounds genuinely confused.

"I just didn't want to spend years and years with everyone glaring at me every time we did something together just because I couldn't make it through one dinner without trying to be polite," says Carlos. "I know _you_ think I'm perfect, but – what? What is it?"

Cecil's grinning – no, smiling – no, _beaming_ at him, practically aglow with joy, even though the name of Steve Carlsberg has been uttered in the past thirty seconds.

Carlos’s heart feels like it’s trying to leap into his throat. He swallows and repeats, "What is it?" 

"Years and years?" asks Cecil.

"I," says Carlos. "I meant – it's an expression – I'm not saying we have to – time isn’t real," he mutters, looking down at his lap.

Cecil rarely talks about the future, a fact Carlos deeply appreciates – when he’s listening to the radio, and he realizes that Cecil’s seeming broadcasting omniscience reveals _another_ wayward trickle from the Currents of Time, and he has to hope it’s not enough to damage the present; when he's planning campaigns with dwindling manpower against shadowy enemies with unknown but seemingly unlimited resources, and coming up with the same dismal projections for the future of the human race again and again; when he’s trying and failing to figure out relationships, but can just about manage to make them both happy for at least the next week, or day, or minute.

The future is unknown, and the unknown can be terrifying, and while Carlos is more than capable of shouldering that burden, sometimes not having to do that is... really nice. He thought Cecil felt the same way, that he didn’t need any reassurance about _their_ future, but maybe…

Cecil's hand appears in Carlos’ field of vision, reaching out and taking his own. "Whatever you say," says Cecil. Not flippantly. He says it like he means it, like he trusts that whatever Carlos will say, Carlos will mean it, too. Like he believes that whatever Carlos decides for them will be the best decision, and even though Carlos disagrees with him – strongly – his confidence is catching.

Carlos looks up and meets Cecil’s eyes. “I meant we should do it again sometime,” he says. "Just... not too soon."

"Sounds perfect," says Cecil.

Carlos starts the car and drives home one-handed so he doesn't have to let go. Maybe sometimes, when you’re staring into the vast and crushing darkness with someone beside you, taking their hand and leading the way isn’t such a burden at all.

**Author's Note:**

> ME: Chapter 13 is off to beta! I think I'll finish writing that one deleted scene since I haven't posted anything else in so long.  
>  _Eleven thousand words later..._  
>  ME: Why am I like this.
> 
> Thank you everyone for your patience and support! A couple things:
> 
> \- New chapter soon!  
> \- I spelled it 'Janis' in honor of famed meteorologists Ian and Joplin.  
> \- I'm not a member of the Deaf community. I've tried not to do anything jerky, but if I've messed up and you would like me to change that, let me know and I'll do my best to fix it!
> 
>    
>    
>  _Spoilery content notes below._  
>     
>  
> 
> \- canon-typical child endangerment/harm, i.e. small children playing with sharp objects  
> \- someone offering an unsolicited opinion on someone else's weight  
> \- food snobbery  
> \- Steve Carlsberg

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Family, Fortitude, Fence-building, and Friendly Propaganda](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11367432) by [shadydave](https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadydave/pseuds/shadydave), [Subsequent](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Subsequent/pseuds/Subsequent)




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